


About to Fall

by Drenagon



Series: Lessons Well Learnt [18]
Category: The Hobbit (Jackson Movies), The Hobbit - All Media Types, The Hobbit - J. R. R. Tolkien, The Lord of the Rings (Movies), The Lord of the Rings - All Media Types, The Lord of the Rings - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Complete, Gen, One Shot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-05
Updated: 2017-06-05
Packaged: 2018-11-09 07:54:52
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,622
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11100234
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Drenagon/pseuds/Drenagon
Summary: Erebor would never allow Bilbo to come to any harm.





	About to Fall

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ISeeFire](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ISeeFire/gifts).



> Unless I'm asked for any further scenes by readers, this will probably be the last one-shot in this series. It was written for ISeeFire when she was having a truly terrible day, and needed fluff to cheer her up.

About to Fall

‘It’s not suddenly going to grow a handrail because you glared so ferociously at it, bâhuh,’ Thorin commented wryly as he approached Bilbo’s stationary form. He had been watching Bilbo for some minutes, trying to decide why on earth his old friend was standing absolutely still at one end of the main walkway towards the throne.

At first, he’d thought that perhaps Bilbo was viewing some of the names carved along the side of the path. Each of the Company tended to do this from time to time, to take a few spare moments from their day for remembrance. As Bifur had once told Thorin solemnly, ‘If we can’t take the time to think of them, after facing the evil that killed them and nearly dying ourselves, then how can we expect people who’ve never even seen Smaug to appreciate their loss.’

That explanation would perhaps have worked better if Bilbo had been looking at the path itself. Instead, his gaze had seemed to be fixated on the very edge of the walkway, almost as if he was contemplating the great chasm beyond.

Well, ‘great chasm’ if you happened to be a small hobbit with an occasional penchant for melodrama. In Thorin’s personal opinion, it was a small drop with plenty of other walkways below it to interrupt the empty space, at the edge of a _very_ wide path which was perfectly designed to make sure no one fell off the edge.

Bilbo and he never had agreed on this topic.

And if they hadn’t by now, nearly thirty years into their friendship and after facing two near-fatal quests together, in all likelihood they never would.

Even so, Thorin had to laugh at the realisation that Bilbo was, once again, mentally condemning dwarven architecture during a quiet moment.

Who said that hobbits could not hold grudges?

‘It would if it had the smallest amount of decency!’ Bilbo said smartly, showing very little other reaction to Thorin’s presence. It was only when Thorin looked closely, surprised that Bilbo had not turned to speak to him face-to-face, that he noticed that Bilbo’s hands were shaking.

‘Bilbo?’ he asked, voice suddenly far less amused and far more concerned. ‘Bilbo, what is it?’

‘Our mountain,’ Bilbo said with great emphasis, ‘is trying to _kill me_ , Thorin.’ Thorin would have laughed, had it not been for those shaking hands. Bilbo had stood on Mount Doom as it blew itself to rubble around him. He did not scare easily.

‘Our mountain would never try to kill you,’ Thorin pointed out gently, reaching out to take one of those trembling hands and enclosing it in both of his own. ‘I have it on the very best of authorities that our mountain adores both you and Frodo even more than she does the boys. Before you arrived, Bofur and Bifur did not actually think it was possible for Erebor to love anyone more than she does those boys. Bilbo, will you not just tell me what happened?’

Bilbo was silent for a long moment, his left hand gripping Thorin’s right with some strength. Thorin was only vaguely aware that, in this position, he was basically hugging Bilbo from behind. When he heard Bilbo’s next words, unsurprising though they probably were in this scenario, Thorin was very glad for their stance. It made him feel infinitely better in the face of a whispered,

‘I nearly fell.’

Thorin tightened his grip instinctively, then instantly loosened his hands for fear of breaking something in Bilbo’s. It was habit, by now, to adjust his own strength to ensure he did not harm his hobbits. They were so much stronger than they looked, and so much more fragile than even the smallest of his dwarven nieces and nephews, all at the same time.

‘How?’ Thorin asked, making sure to keep his voice gentle. ‘You never get close enough to the edge to fall.’

‘Not normally, no,’ Bilbo acknowledged. ‘There was a new carving. One of Mena’s. They’re so beautiful, and I wanted a closer look. Only I overbalanced somehow and for a moment I thought I would fall. Maybe it was silly. Probably I was too far from the edge for it to really be a problem… but I thought….’

Thorin drew Bilbo back slightly further from the edge, coincidentally bringing him closer to Thorin’s own body.

‘I should have a railing put in,’ he said softly, mind trying not to consider how close he might have come to losing Bilbo. All his earlier thoughts about the safety of Erebor’s halls vanished like bellows’ steam in the face of what had almost happened here. What was the point of having an impressive throne room, designed at the height of dwarven ingenuity, if he was to lose Bilbo off the edge of it?

‘No, don’t be silly,’ Bilbo scolded after a bare second’s pause. All of the nervousness he had shown when Thorin arrived had seeped away, his hand now steady in Thorin’s own, his body leaning easily back against Thorin’s chest. ‘You cannot ruin something hundreds of years old because I lost my balance for a moment. I will be more careful in future. If I want to look at one of the carvings, I’ll just make sure I have one of you with me. I’m told old people falter more easily than the young; clearly I am just getting old!’

‘You are _not_ old,’ Thorin said firmly. ‘You are a hobbit in the prime of life. You told me so only last week. And I will not risk losing you to something so ridiculous when we should have decades together yet.’

Finally, Bilbo turned and looked Thorin directly in the eye, laughing a little as he did so.

‘It is fine, Thorin,’ he reassured. ‘It was only a brief instant and then it was done. I overreacted, and now I have you doing the same. I nearly slipped off that Fell Beast, once, and I am fairly sure it was not wonderful reflexes that saved me. I doubt my saviour would let me fall off a ledge at home now.’

‘And you would be right,’ Mahal confirmed easily, appearing next to them so suddenly that anyone not used to his abrupt appearances might have startled. Thankfully, they were far enough from the edge now that that startling like that would not have been dangerous.

They were, however, used to these sudden appearances; mostly because Eru seemed to have decided that, as long as he did not change the course of history again, what Mahal did with his group of natural and adopted children was his own business and not something which Eru either needed or wished to know about.

The conferences between Thorin’s creator and the King of Erebor could not exactly be considered regular, but they were not exactly irregular either.

Thorin had once, briefly, considered objecting to the fact that Mahal generally only appeared to his selected few, and so Thorin occasionally appeared to be talking to empty air. Then he had realised that this was only likely to encourage Mahal, and had decided to just accept the reputation of ‘eccentricity’ which Aragorn was also cultivating in Gondor.

Sometimes it was just easier not to argue.

‘Bilbo is perfectly safe from Erebor, Thorin, I promise you,’ Mahal continued, momentarily dropping the fine layer of sarcasm he usually used with his unacknowledged favourite. ‘She and I keep a very close eye on both of our hobbits. We will let no harm come to him.’

‘And what, exactly, could Erebor do if Bilbo were suddenly to fall?’ Thorin asked, using all the sarcasm which Mahal had left unattended.

‘I think you would be surprised what the stone can do when necessary,’ Mahal said cryptically, smiling slightly as he did so. ‘Kíli could enlighten you, I am sure.’

With that, he was gone again. Thorin, well-used to these exits and entrances, merely sighed and shook his head as he would if Fíli or Kíli had been presented to him after getting into yet another scrape.

Looking down at Bilbo, who had one eyebrow raised in laughter, Thorin noticed that they were still standing in their hug and that they were receiving some amused looks from nearby dwarves.

He ignored that, too. If they were not used to him and Bilbo by now, then there was no hope for them.

Besides, Legolas had spent almost the entirety of his last visit carrying Kíli around on his back and completely ignoring Kíli’s objections, so it was not as if Thorin and Bilbo were the most entertaining sight to have occurred in Erebor that year. Or even that month.

‘Do you not have ruling to do, oh great King?’ Bilbo asked wryly, after a brief pause to appreciate the unpredictability of their lives.

‘Probably,’ Thorin acknowledged reluctantly. ‘Is Balin hovering anywhere nearby?’

Bilbo peeked around Thorin’s side for a moment, chuckled quietly and looked back up at Thorin again.

‘No,’ he informed Thorin with a pretence of solemnity, ‘but Ori is standing about twenty-five feet away and bouncing on his toes. Fíli looks as if he’s about to try and pin him to the floor.’

Thorin sighed.

‘If it were anyone but Ori,’ he told Bilbo, ‘I would leave them to their fate.’

‘Of course you would,’ Bilbo assured him as Thorin dropped his arms and straightened his shoulders. ‘But it _is_ Ori, and also your kingdom, and so you will go.’

‘And so I will go,’ Thorin confirmed. Then he turned and beckoned Ori towards him.

Bilbo would be perfectly safe, Thorin reminded himself. Mahal would make sure of it, and Thorin would see him again in a few hours, just to make sure.

******


End file.
